by Michele Hauf
“Blu, the information comes from a reliable snitch,” Creed explained calmly.
She tugged from his touch. What was Ryan up to? And how could her father not be aware if he were running blood sport?
“So what are you going to do?” she asked softly. “Kill him?”
“We don’t murder wolves, Blu.” He met her defiant stare. Earlier he’d confessed to that very wicked deed. “Not unless given no other option. We rescue the vampires your pack has starved for months and forces to fight for their lives.”
“Not my pack. His information isn’t right. I know it. Ryan would never—” She hated the condescending glare Alexandre pinned on her. And she, looking a pitiful mess with the milk all over. “You can’t hurt him, Creed.”
“I’m not sure what we’re going to do yet. Can we discuss this later? Alexandre and I have strategizing to do.”
At once, she felt small and controlled. A familiar feeling she had thought to abandon living with Creed.
She pushed past him and rushed up the stairs.
“Touchy,” Alexandre said. “Must be that time of the month. Oh, right, the full moon soon. Yikes, man.”
Bastard. Blu slammed the guest bedroom door shut and beat the bed and muffled a scream into the pillows.
Had she given Creed her trust too quickly?
AFTER ALEXANDRE LEFT, Creed was heading up the stairs to check on Blu when the doorbell rang. He redirected his path. The air-conditioning technician had arrived to install his goods. Creed took him around back and they found the best place to locate the unit. He left the technician in the basement, tinkering with the ventilation system, and caught Blu as she was walking out the front door.
“Do you mind if I take the BMW?” she asked, dangling the keys she could have only taken from his top desk drawer.
“Of course not, but I wish you’d told me you were going somewhere. You might be followed.”
“Nah. I’m good at the evasive.”
She was dressed unusually today with a straight peach wig and subdued gray skirt and white blousy top. She looked ready to sit behind a computer and type away the day—if not for the fishnet stockings.
“What’s up?”
“Hmm? Oh, I’m headed to the mall. Need some new things. I suppose I should break in that shiny black credit card you gave me.”
“I thought you wanted to talk about Ryan?”
“I do, but it can wait until later. Is Alexandre still around?” A glance outside spied the technician’s van. “Oh, the air-conditioning guy is here! I’m so ready for some cool air.” She leaned in to kiss Creed’s cheek. “See you later, lover.”
Creed puzzled why her exit was rushed, almost evasive. She’d gone from raging over his knowledge of Ryan’s involvement in the blood matches, to a shopping frenzy.
“Women.”
Chapter Thirteen
THE STRIP MALLS IN this suburb offered nothing of interest to Blu. For maximum shopping pleasure, she’d have to drive to Minneapolis to satisfy her fashion cravings on Nicollet Avenue. But she didn’t have cravings today.
At the edge of the Otsego suburb, a line of two-year-old condominiums fronted in redbrick, each with two-point-five trees per yard and bright red flowers near the steps, advertised idyllic domestic life.
Boring stuff, but the perfect hideout for a werewolf.
Parking the BMW before the condo with the weeds growing knee-high in the front yard, Blu marched to the door and knocked. She scanned the neighboring houses, alert for twitching curtains. No one watched.
For Sale signs dotted every other yard. The housing crisis had hit the newer developments hard. She stood in a literal ghost town.
It took a while before she heard thumps inside. Someone stumbling out of bed, stubbing his toe on the stair rail and swearing loudly.
Nothing had changed in the weeks she’d been away. He’d always been a late sleeper, and ever lazy about tending the yard. Had she actually mowed the lawn for the guy?
The door opened to reveal a man she couldn’t muster a smile for now. Try as she might to summon an iota of lust for the muscled physique and ripped abs, she couldn’t do it. She had no interest in Eugene Ryan. Save getting to the truth.
“As I live and breathe,” Ryan said. He shoved a hand over his bald head, then slid it down his rock-hard abs. “Blu Masterson. You finally find your way from that longtooth’s lair? Come here.”
He reached for her, but reared back and snarled viciously. “You smell like a fucking longtooth.”
“Yeah? So what did you expect?” She strolled inside and he stepped back out of disgust. “I do live with the guy.”
The real disgust was this condo. She didn’t remember him being such a sloth. Of course, she had done the laundry, vacuuming and all the cooking.
“You reek like vampire. Hell, sweetie, come upstairs and take a shower with me.”
“Don’t think so. I’m not here to suck face.”
“Blu, what the hell?”
He grabbed for her arm, but she dodged him and pressed her back to the wall. Growling lowly, she surprised herself with the evasive reaction. Two weeks ago she would have endured Ryan’s machismo.
“What’s with you? Don’t tell me you like the guy?”
“Creed is not the topic of this conversation,” she said. “The fact that you’ve been going behind my father’s back and organizing blood matches is.”
“What? Where’d you hear something whacked like that? Blu, that’s not my scene.”
“Isn’t it?”
She roamed her gaze around the room. The distinct odor of blood put her off. It was not a scent she expected in a werewolf’s home. She didn’t want to believe he was involved, but why would Creed lie to her?
“You’ve been talking to Dean Maverick’s pack?” she asked.
“You know I have. It’s for the both of us. Your father will never step down and allow me to lead.”
“And Maverick is thinking of going lone wolf on his pack?”
“In a few months.” Not a very sure answer. “We’ll be made, Blu. I’ll become leader of the Western pack, and you’ll be my girl.”
“But I’ll reek of longtooth. How will you have me then?”
“Sweetie.” He tugged her to him and she stood in his arms, mostly because he was too strong for her to struggle free. “Where’s a kiss for the only man who loves you?”
“I thought my smell disgusted you?”
“I don’t notice it much now. Come on, kiss me.”
She put up her fingers to block his kiss, which was the wrong thing to do.
Ryan could slip into rage mode in half a second. He shoved her against the wall and pounded the wall above her shoulder. Fangs descending, he snarled.
“I gotta know you still love me, Blu. Don’t do this to me. You’d better not be sleeping with that vampire.”
“Sleeping? Not so much.” Who had time when sex lasted through the night?
The punch to her gut was not unexpected. Blu took it and rolled aside, putting distance between them by stepping around behind the easy chair. “I don’t like being your punching bag anymore, Ryan.”
“Blu, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. You know how to push my buttons.”
“Yeah, like the homicidal maniac button?”
“I hate you like this! If I see that vampire…”
“You’ll what? Chain him up and starve him? Force him to the blood match?”
“Maybe I will!”
“You bastard, you are involved in the matches.”
He fisted the wall, putting another hole below the first. “Only because your father ordered me to.”
“What?”
“Oh, get over yourself, Blu. You’re playing the blind fool as usual? The spoiled and naive princess act is growing old. You know damn well Amandus has his hands in every down and dirty dealing this side of the Twin Cities.”
“My father would never participate in the blood sport.”
“Of course not. He’s got
me as his proxy for that. But he’s a heavy dipper, let me tell you. Takes fifty percent of the profits. That’s why I gotta get Maverick to bite the big one. Once I’m pack leader, all profits will be mine.”
Bite the big one? As in…die?
Blu clung to the wall, her fingernails digging into the cracks. Her father had ordered Ryan to run the blood matches? Since when was Ryan so power hungry? Would he really murder Maverick to gain position as a principal?
This was not the kind of man she could ever care for. “Were you doing this when we were together?”
“It’s not often, Blu. Hell, it takes a couple months to get them ready for the fight anyway. Unless the UV sickness sets in—then it speeds up the process nicely. Oh, don’t give me that look. They deserve it! My grandfather’s generation was entirely wiped out due to the longtooths hunting us. Turnaround is a bitch!”
“But my father didn’t ask you to do this until…”
She couldn’t decide what was worse, having cared for Ryan or learning that her father was more evil than she’d suspected.
“There’s so much you don’t know about Amandus. It would spin your head, little Miss Princess.”
She didn’t like it when he called her that. It was always in a mocking tone.
“What else is there to know?”
Ryan punched a fist into his palm. “You really want to know? How’s about a kiss to loosen up my lips?”
“Just tell me!”
“Don’t think so. Not without a little lovin’ to show me you’re still my girl.”
Blu bowed her head and fisted her hands. She could not do it. She would not approach him in any way that would encourage his misplaced lust. He was so…uncouth.
Had she changed so drastically since that first night when Creed had labeled her the same?
Yes, I think so. Good for me.
“You thinking about whether you want to do it upstairs or right here on the landing, sweetie?”
“Don’t call me that. I’m leaving.” She swung around and marched to the front door. Before her fingers touched the knob, Ryan called out—
“He killed your mother!”
Blu’s jaw dropped. She palmed the wall to steady herself. Her father had—No. No, it couldn’t be. Drawing up courage, she sucked in a breath and straightened. She approached Ryan. “You lie.”
“Not about that, Blu. I’d never make up such a cruel story. I heard Amandus was in such a rage after finding out your mother was screwing a vampire he ripped her head clean from her neck.”
“A—a vampire?”
Bile rising in her throat, Blu ran for the door, but he caught her by the wrist. Rage widened Ryan’s pupils to devious darkness. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“I shouldn’t have come here.” She was assailed by images of her mother…her father…
Her mother had had an affair with a vampire?
“You know what else?” Ryan’s colorless eyes searched hers. He stood so close she could taste the beer on his breath. “I’m guessing this whole ‘let’s kill all the vampires’ rant of your father’s is revenge. Pure and simple. He’s going to stake every damn longtooth because his wife fucked one of ‘em.”
“Stop saying that! You know nothing.”
“And now his daughter is doing the same damn thing.”
“No.” The denial squeaked out. He had drained her resistance.
“Seriously? So you’re not fucking the vamp?”
She kicked, but her heel only managed to slide down his thigh. Ryan grinned and caught her ankle. “Let’s put all that nastiness aside. You’re here now. Let’s get busy, for old times’ sake.”
“Never! The things you’ve told me—”
“Your father wouldn’t like hearing I said anything about your mother.” He dragged his tongue up her cheek. His eyes, which she’d once thought caring, now glinted with madness. “What will you force me to do to keep you silent?”
She didn’t want the hurt he could give her. It wasn’t right. She didn’t have to take the pain to feel loved. Creed had taught her that.
“I won’t say anything. Let me go, Ryan, please.”
She struggled free. Palms slapping to the wall behind her, she spread her legs, maintaining a ready stance. Her heart pounding against her ribs, she eyed the door.
“Yeah? Maybe I believe you, maybe I don’t. Your longtooth is the one who heads that inane rescue team. Did he send you here?”
“No, he thinks I’m shopping. I swear it. Ryan, I won’t tell. I just…You have to stop this. It’s not right. We’ll never have peace—”
“Don’t give me that bullshit. You buying into the fantasy now? Blu, you know your father never intended for your marriage to result in peace. It’s a bait and switch for the big assault. You haven’t told the vampire about our plans, have you?”
“No.” She looked to the door. Ryan’s aggression crept like dirt across her skin. How had she ever tolerated him as a lover?
Because she had known nothing else—until now.
“Blu, are you lying to me? You look me in the eye and tell me the vampires aren’t aware of the pack’s plans. This is big, Blu. If you know something, your father has to know, too.”
He swung her about, his grip pinching her flesh. The man’s eyes were frenzied. He looked near to shifting. She hated his werewolf. It always hurt her.
“I would never compromise the pack,” she said calmly. “I swear it to you.”
She heeled him on the shin and broke away. Tugging open the door, she gasped in the fresh air before turning to him.
“I can’t love a man who murders for sport. Goodbye, Ryan.”
SHE PERCHED AT THE pool’s edge, the peach wig tossed to the side and a scatter of dark hair spilling across her shoulders. The sunshades had been rolled back hours earlier, and now the starry sky twinkled about the moon, which looked deceptively round. In another evening it would be completely full.
She hadn’t carried in a single bag from the so-called shopping trip. Creed hadn’t suspected she was in a shopping mood. Now, he could verily feel the sadness waft from her as if heat waves whisping from sunbaked sand.
Kicking off his shoes outside the sliding glass door, he padded across the cool patio stones and sat beside her on the towel. Just like her, he dangled his feet in the water.
The stars twinkled in her gray eyes, focused above the treetops. He didn’t say anything for a long time. They simply sat there, admiring the sky.
He briefly wondered about tomorrow night. She couldn’t become a monster, not his wife. And even if she did shift and alter shape, he was a big boy; he could handle it. She wanted him to see her. It would be good. He would make it so.
Her profile glittered under the moonlight. No faery dust tonight, just soft sensuous skin and wide, bright eyes.
Had he ever shared silence with another person and felt it deep in his being? Blu’s heartbeats filled him. She had become as much a part of him as possible. Had he bitten her and tasted her blood, their heartbeats would synch.
Soon. He prayed for that. It would bond them as he’d never been bonded to another.
Yet now he sensed her misery. It felt dark and cold.
When she tilted her head to look at him, grief clutched his heart. She still did not speak, but her eyes asked him for forgiveness.
“You went to see him?” he guessed.
She nodded.
“Because of what Alexandre reported?”
Please let it be because of that and not because she missed her lover.
Blu took his hand and kissed the palm. She traced her finger along his lifeline and pressed her face into it. Teardrops moistened his flesh.
“Ryan told you the truth?”
“I didn’t think he was like that. Bloodthirsty,” she whispered. “And not like you, because you need it. Ryan’s thirsty for sport.”
“He confessed to you?”
“My father ordered him to set up the matches.”
Creed sucked i
n a breath.
“I promised him I wouldn’t tell you.”
“Well, I already know. And you didn’t really tell me. I guessed, so you’re safe there.”
“I don’t want to do anything to please Ryan anymore. I hate him. I don’t understand how I could have ever thought he cared for me. He cared to screw me, that’s all it was. And because he was less vicious than the others, I accepted him. I was the only reason he ever became scion.”
Creed tucked her head against his shoulder and stroked her hair.
“We won’t move in on him. As I’ve said, we don’t use force unless confronted.”
And if the Council could just get behind that…
Hell, was he being truthful with himself? He’d already admitted he loved taking off wolves’ heads. Blu had split him neatly, filling half his ego with the desire for peace, while the other half could never completely abandon the vengeance and survival tactics that ran through his blood.
“Best scenario would be to get a man on the inside to infiltrate and notify us where they keep the vampires,” he said. “If we could raid and rescue their stock, we might have some success in stopping the blood matches.”
“Creed, please don’t think I approve of the matches.”
“I know you don’t.”
She shivered. Tears rolled down her cheek. “There’s something else. Something so horrible Ryan told me.”
He hugged her to him when she broke down, sobbing loudly. Whatever it was, it clenched about his heart. He hated that anyone could hurt Blu like this. That so many had used and abused her. How had she survived all these years in the pack?
“My father,” she said between sniffles. “Ryan said he killed my mother. I never knew that. I thought she’d left him years ago, and no one knew where she was. But Ryan confirmed she had an affair.”
“I’m sorry.”
“With a vampire.”
“What?”
“My mother. Supposedly she had an affair with a vampire.”
She found his gaze and Creed felt her need clutch at his soul. He hugged her closer to him. “How does that make you feel?”
“I don’t know what to think. It’s insane to consider. And if it is true, why would my father push me into the arms of a vampire just like his wife had done? It makes so little sense.”